IT FOLLOWS: The Worst Date Movie of 2015

With the blockbuster success of Fifty Shades of Grey in cinemas worldwide, many pundits are claiming that this marks a new era for “sex positive” movies – and much more importantly, the basic idea of a woman being as sexually open as her male counterparts not being a source of cinematic shame, but one of pride. It has only been two decades since what I dub the “unofficial Michael Douglas misogyny trilogy” of Fatal Attraction, Basic Instinct and Disclosure hit cinemas, films that (like Fifty Shades) were successful due to their frankness of sexuality.

Yet those movies were inherently misogynist in suggesting that women were mentally unstable, or just plain evil for daring to be as open about their sexuality as men. Thankfully, social attitudes have changed and now we can have both blockbuster hits and critically acclaimed art house movies (The Duke of Burgundy) that don’t treat female sexuality as some sort of anomaly, or worse still, as a source of humor. So why is it then that It Follows, the most sex-negative film I’ve seen recently, is the best movie on the subject? In a time when mainstream pop culture is becoming so sex positive, maybe it’s just a natural response to appreciate something so completely different.

One of the film’s flaws in its earliest scenes is that it constantly switches between genres, from a slow-paced mumblecore coming of age drama to a surreal Takashi Miike-style horror movie (in the same jet-black vein as Audition) without any prior warning. When the movie properly introduces its central conceit, everything begins falling into place. Maika Monroe stars in the lead role of Jay, a girl in her late teens who is currently dating Hugh (Jake Weary), a guy a couple of years older than she, but far more immature. A date at the cinema is cut short when he appears to see an ex-girlfriend at the back of the auditorium, but later they meet up and consummate their relationship despite any earlier awkwardness.

After sex, Jay is about to open up to Hugh emotionally; instead he chloroforms her and ties her to a wheelchair in an abandoned warehouse, telling her of what’s about to happen. “It,” a constantly shape-shifting figure that could either look like a stranger or somebody close to her, will now follow her, trying to kill her. She is the only person who can see this figure and if it kills her, then it works its way back down the chain killing every person until it gets to the originator of the disease. Of course, there is a way to stop these visions – and there are no prizes for guessing what that is.

That rare thing: A horror movie with something to say

As with all the best horror movies, its genius lies in how it’s clearly a comment on a serious socio-political issue (like George A. Romero’s Night of the Living Dead being about racism), but done in such an intelligent way it functions as a straightforward horror first and foremost. There are a ton of problems with It Follows, but there are so many well realized ideas in the movie that these problems only ever get in the way for mere moments at a time.

With the best horror directors always looking for contemporary issues to comment upon, it goes without saying that this isn’t the first horror movie to be a comment about AIDS. The most famous (and most successful) is David Cronenberg’s 1986 remake of The Fly, where the deterioration of Jeff Goldblum’s body as he became the “Brundel-Fly” was clearly designed to mirror the serious body malfunctions of the worst victims of the AIDS virus. However, It Follows doesn’t really function as a body horror, even if its portrayal of sexuality does do a remarkable job of advertising safe-sex to the point that it should be shown in schools worldwide (it goes without saying it is a horrible date movie – I know, I saw it on one).

However, the creepy visuals here are intentionally unrealistic; director David Robert Mitchell’s previous film was the indie-spirited teen drama The Myth of the American Sleepover. After making a realistic coming of age story, he has commendably decided to go in the other direction, with creepy visuals that recall late-period David Lynch (Inland Empire especially) and the repugnant sexual imagery of Takashi Miike’s weirdest films more than any contemporary horror director. Yet despite these obvious influences, it never feels like an art house movie, even though it will likely polarize horror fans and multiplex audiences alike due to the audaciousness of its sex-negative narrative.

The movie doesn’t have a good handle on its own mythology

There is plenty for genre fans to enjoy though; the John Carpenter indebted synth score by Disasterpiece is an obvious treat, even if all it does is underline that the AIDS virus came into the public consciousness in the 80’s more than genre movies from the 80’s themselves. Credit should also go to Maika Monroe, who between this and last year’s terrific The Guest (which also had a bad-ass synth score) is shaping up to be this generation’s Jamie Lee Curtis – a “scream queen” of the highest order.

Even though It Follows is frequently horrifying, its best moments are undercut by the silliness that infects the movie during its later stages, which appear to be at odds with the mythology that has been created. To say any more would be a spoiler, but when the movie turns into a bizarre cross between Poltergeist and long-forgotten Rik Mayall comedy Drop Dead Fred in the final act, it is very hard not to feel it has jumped the shark, sacrificing its originality for the kind of mindless jump scares that populate far lesser films.

It does manage to save itself with a thrillingly ambiguous final scene, that is just a vital reminder of why independent horror movies are so much better than studio ones; studios demand a clear and concise ending in order to make sure people like it and make money. Independent ones can do the more artistically challenging (and scarier) thing. If it wasn’t for the cinema I work at deciding to turn the house lights up midway through the final scene, ruining the fact that it was indeed the final scene, I would probably have walked out of the cinema far more on edge.

Conclusion

It Follows is too uneven to fully recommend, but it does contain some of the most disturbing horror imagery I’ve seen recently. Far from the best horror movie of the year, it is still a vital reminder of how boundary-pushing American genre movies used to be.

Have you seen It Follows? And if so, did you think it was a bold new take on a tried-and-tested horror trope, or just a load of old nonsense?

It Follows was released in the UK on February 27th, with a US release set for March 13th. All international release dates can be found here.

(top image source: RADiUS-TWC)